Praise for CMC Electronics

[rikhall]

Hello all.

We just got back from 31 days of gunk holing around Maine. Down from New Brunswick includes a few longish (eight or nine hours) days. We rely on our Raymarine Wheel Pilot.

Two days from home it started making an ugly "gear grinding" noise when +10 or -10 was pushed. And then, when ever it tried to adjust a course.

I went on the Raymarine website and found an authorized service dealer in Yarmouth NS. I called them and the person answering said "Yes, we can service that for you, but our location in Dartmouth NS does many more of them than we ever see." and gave me the Dartmouth phone number.

I called Dartmouth, the service manager was out. An administrative assistant (in the old days, proably called a secretary) took my call, listened to my story, put me on hold and walked to the service department to see if they had what I thought I needed in stock. When she got back on the phone, she said that they did not have what I needed, but If I sent the unit in, they would confirm what it needed and get the part either from Ontario or Quebec where her computer showed what I thought was the part it needed.

I packaged it up real well, sent it on Purolator and it arrived in Dartmouth the next morning. I called late yesterday and Holly confirmed it had arrived and that it was now with the service people.

I got a call this morning from the service person, he said it was a gear, not the motor. He said he had never seen that happen before. He said it was covered under warranty and that they had already replaced the part and it was ready.

I just happen to have a good friend who was driving to Halifax today (right beside Dartmouth and about a five hour drive each way). John will stop by CMC Electronic and bring my repaired unit back for me.

My first call was Tuesday. I will have the unit back today (Thursday)

Now that is the kind of customer service I really appreciate. Especially with our really short season.

Rik
Mystery

[sailingdog]

I'd point out that the Raymarine WheelDrive II is one of the worst engineered POS I've ever seen. IMHO, the Autohelm version was better engineered, but Raymarine has set the bar pretty low.

[rikhall]

In that case, it is really a good thing the service people are so good.

Cheers

[Jeff_H]

SD,

I had always been suspect of the Raymarine wheel drives, but I have a 6 year old 4000 plus which has had a lot of use and I have been very impressed with it, especially as compared to the Autohelm 4000 that it replaced after the 4000 was damaged by lightning.

Jeff

[bubb2]

Just this year like you Jeff, I replaced my 10 year old 4000 drive unit with a 4000+ drive. Since the control head and the fluxgate compass are the same on both units I only replaced the drive. The + unit is a much better unit but I got 10 years out of the old one and in boat gear terms, thats not to bad!